Chocolate
by glass-jars
Summary: Gabriel owns a little chocolate shop/cafe. One day a tall boy walks in and steals his heart. Pre-slash flirtation.


Gabriel hummed along to Queen as he wiped down the front counter, occasionally tapping his fingers with the beat. A great deal of bright sunlight streamed in through the windows but it was the cold kind and glinted off the snow. It was a Tuesday at one in the afternoon on an icy day in January, and so the only people in his shop were kids playing hooky and... well, really, that was about it. Luckily they weren't particularly loud or rude. One of them even sang along with his music, which made him grin.

The door jingled. Gabriel looked up to see a tall young man—he guessed around twenty-three or so—enter. He waved his hand and the tall boy smiled, face red from the chill outside and hair mussed from the wind.

"What can I do you for, kiddo?" He gestured to the display. "Got lots of chocolate, but you look in need of something a little hotter." He winked, and shoved his rag into his back pocket.

The kid hummed. "Um..." He came closer. "Just some hot chocolate, I guess?" He shrugged.

Gabriel smirked and set about making a nice big mug of the stuff. He tossed over his shoulder, "What's your name, Hercules?"

"Sam."

With one eyebrow raised, Gabriel shook a can of whipped cream. "What a short name for such a tall guy!" He topped off the cocoa with a nice poof of cream and spun around, sliding it across the counter. "You get a special discount for being cute—One dollar and seventy cents." He wiggled his eyebrows.

Sam snorted, but he smiled. He handed Gabriel a two-dollar bill. (Gabriel whistled at that.) As he took his chocolate, he said, "Keep the change."

"Are you flirting with me?" Gabriel crossed his arms.

Sam made a thoughtful face, then broke out into one of the cutest smiles Gabriel had ever seen in his entire thirty-seven years of life. Instead of answering, he just shrugged, and walked away to settle down at a cozy little corner table with his cocoa.

Gabriel blinked.

He laughed to himself.

...

Sam came back the next day with a little sticky note held in his gloved hand and a dorky knit cab pulled down snug over his forehead. "Uh," He glanced down at his post-it. "My brother wants a slice of chocolate cheesecake, and a bag of what he calls 'chocolate boobs.'" He rolled his eyes.

Gabriel burst out laughing. "Truffles and cheesecake, comin' right up." He grinned the whole time he packaged everything, and brightened it even more when he took Sam's money, making sure to meet his eyes and resisting the urge to wink. (His cousin had always said he winked far too often. He blamed his big brother.)

Sam shook his head but smiled back. And then he was gone again. Gabriel was a little disappointed to see him go, but he found the brief view of Sam's backside particularly enjoyable. His cousin, Anna, who helped him out sometimes, elbowed him in the ribs and told him to focus. He pouted at her and received only an annoyed glare.

...

The third time Sam came by was in the middle of a snow storm.

He practically barreled into the shop and shook himself off like a dog, quickly pulling off his wet coat and scarf and hanging them on the back of the nearest empty chair until he stood just his thick-knit blue and pink sweater and his jeans and boots and what looked like a dark brown buttoned shirt under all that. Gabe's suspicions were confirmed when Sam rolled up his sleeves. The shirt under his sweater was the color of coffee.

Gabriel raised his eyebrows at Sam. "I hope you're not goin' back out there until it calms down."

Sam glanced over his shoulder, at the dark street and driving snow. "Oh—no. Definitely not." He rubbed his red nose, sniffling, and moved his gaze to the chalkboard hanging on the wall behind Gabriel. His eyes flicked back and forth as he read the list of drinks.

Finally, "You know, hot apple cider sounds really good right now."

Gabriel smiled. "No problem. Anything else?" He turned away and grabbed his jug of cider from the little fridge. A simple thing to make.

"Maybe. I dunno. What do you think?"

Gabriel smirked as he heated the drink. "I think you need something hot and full of butter." He handed off the mug and the bent down to rummage in the display case. He held up a chocolate filled croissant. "Lemme just heat this up for you."

Sam nodded and slid a ten dollar bill onto the counter.

Gabriel set his now-hot croissant on a nice little blue plate. He sprinkled it with powdered sugar and set in front of Sam before quickly completing the transaction and passing off his change. Sam smiled at him gratefully, still pink in the face.

His table was a little nearer the counter, this time, so Gabriel decided to struck up a conversation. (After the poor boy had gotten a little warmed up, of course.)

He said, "So, Samsquatch." Leaned his elbows on the counter and propped his chin in his hands. "You a student?"

Mouth full of pastry, Sam nodded. He swallowed and cleared his throat, sipping from his apple cider. "Yeah, uh—I was gonna be a law student but I ended up in uh..." He looked down at his plate, and Gabriel could have sworn he blushed. "Well, I'm majoring in linguistics." He ripped another chunk from his croissant—with a fork, no less—and stuffed it into his mouth.

"Linguistics?" Gabriel grinned. "Neat! Does that mean you get to learn a bunch of languages?"

Sam looked over at him. He seemed to be a little surprised, but he smiled. "Not exactly." He shrugged. "It's, uh—It's like... More about the structure of language, and what changes language and the causes of it, and like... other stuff." He trailed off, scratching the back of his neck.

Gabriel laughed and pushed away from the counter. "Sounds fascinating." He pulled a candy bar from the pocket of his neon pink apron. "Of course, when I was your age I spent most of my college career baking cakes and drinking rum." He gave a waggle of his eyebrows. "And engaging in wild orgies."

Sam coughed on his cider, and when he set it on the table he turned away to laugh into his shoulder.

"Aw, did I shock you?"

Sam shook his head, wiping at his eyes, and shot Gabriel a half-hearted glare. "I could've choked to death, and then my big brother would have sued you." The corners of his mouth curled up, despite his attempt at being stern. He took a bite of his croissant and licked a smear of chocolate off of his thumb.

Gabriel glanced away. (The kid had quite the pretty mouth. It was hard not to stare at it.)

Sam gave him a strange look, and leaned back in his chair with his hands folded in his lap. "What's your name?" He tilted his head.

"Me? I'm Gabriel." Gabriel beamed at Sam. "If you call me 'Gabe,' I'll shiv you with a candy cane."

Sam pulled a rather horrified face. "I'll keep that in mind." He smiled and turned back to his almost-empty plate. "But that's kind of hypocritical—calling me by all those silly nicknames and then not letting me do the same." He nibbled on his food.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes at Sam with his eyebrows raised high. "You still can't call me 'Gabe.'"

"Can I call you 'Shortstack'?" Sam smirked into his mug.

Gabriel blinked at him. "What? No!" He planted a hand on his chest. "I'm way older than you! You can't name me after a stack of pancakes!"

"How old _are_ you, anyway?" Sam scooted his chair around a bit to better face Gabriel, with his mug grasped between his (very pretty) hands. "Fifty?"

"_Excuse_ me?!" Gabriel opened his mouth wide, half-offended and half-amused. Sam burst into a little fit of chuckles, hunched over his cider. He had dimples. Gabriel flushed and pouted and rubbed one hand over his mouth before muttering, "You're a _saucy_ boy." He glowered—more of a pained grin than a grimace, though—down at the counter.

"Did you just quote Shakespeare at me?" Sam cocked his head.

Gabriel shrugged. "Maybe." Smiling softly, he briefly met Sam's eyes before looking away again. He stared at the snow whipping around outside. He could feel Sam watching him. The café was empty and warm, and he could hear Sam's quiet breaths. He went to his radio and set it to play a CD of Elvis' greatest hits.

They chatted off and on for a while, until the weather calmed, at which point Sam began tugging on his jacket and scarf, and a pair of gloves, and a hat. Just as he reached the door, Gabriel blurted out, "I'm thirty-seven!"

Sam grinned at him. The door jingled merrily as it closed and he disappeared into the evening.

Gabriel leaned his forehead on the counter with a groan. "I'm a moron."

...

Sam didn't come by for a while. Anna told Gabriel he was just being paranoid, and that someone he'd met three times had no obligation to visit constantly, and that he was annoying. He glared at her, and she laughed, calling him a child.

When Sam finally dropped by a week later, Gabriel's brain emptied and he shot the boy a five-thousand watt beam.

Sam looked taken aback. But he smiled. "Miss me?" He shrugged out of his jacket.

"Of course not." Gabriel feigned nonchalance, but in truth he felt like he'd injected a few shots of caffeine directly into his bloodstream. He straightened his apron, ducking his head with a grin. "You take up so much space I was relieved you didn't come by." A bold-faced lie. "What do you want to eat?"

Sam laughed under his breath. "Liar." He leaned his hip on the counter. "I don't have anything in mind today, so make me something special." He smiled down at Gabriel and raised his eyebrows in as if daring him to say no.

"Special?" Gabriel loved a good challenge. "One Sasquatch Special comin' right up. Sit your ass down right there." He gestured to the nearest table. Sam laughed louder, that time, and did as he was told. Gabriel turned away. He could feel Sam's eyes on his back but he ignored the tingling feeling in his neck and set about mixing little things together and heating other things in the rather small kitchen just barely hidden from the rest of the shop.

After a little while, he came back out into the main area, hiding his little creation behind his back. "Close your eyes." He couldn't help but grin widely when Sam squeeze his eyes shut. He practically skipped over, and set a nice plate and a mug in front of Sam. "Open them."

Sam looked down at the pile of chocolate on his plate. "What is it?"

"It is an improvised lava cake—" Gabriel cleared his throat. "By which I mean I cut up a muffin and covered it in chocolate sauce and then put it in the microwave for five minutes." He pointed at the mug. "And that's just chocolate milk." He cracked a smile.

"Wha—" Sam started to laugh, leaning over the plate. "You make gourmet desserts and coffee for a living and all you could think of was to microwave a muffin?" He wiped at the corner of one eye and shook his head. "You are... amazing."

Gabriel smirked. "I am, aren't I?"

He laughed when Sam shoved at him.

...

"You've got a crush."

Gabriel froze. "What—No I don't!" He whirled around, wooden spoon in hand, ready to glare at Anna. But her expression of knowing amusement made him roll his eyes and cross his arm. Chocolate batter smeared across his apron and he pouted a little. "Okay, so what if I _do_?"

Anna smirked. "You're an idiot." She sifted some flour into a mixing bowl while Gabriel bustled around the little kitchen, setting his spoon down and opening the fridge to rummage around. "You should ask him out."

Gabriel nearly dropped the jug of milk in his hand, and gaped at her. "What? No!" He thunked it down on the counter. "I'm like twenty years older than him!" He poured a substantial amount of milk into a glass measuring cup before dumping it into his too-thick batter.

"Hardly. You can't be more than sixteen years his senior." Anna mixed some cinnamon into her dry mix.

Gabriel scoffed. "That's still almost old enough to be his father."

"He doesn't give a shit, so why should you?"

Gabriel gaped at her, and rolled his eyes, turning back to his task-at-hand. The sound of the spoon scraping the sides of the bowl filled the kitchen. Anna sighed and raised her hands in defeat. She slid a little bottle of coffee extract to Gabriel. They worked in silence for the rest of the morning.

...

Gabriel couldn't keep his mind off of Anna's advice—"ask him out." On the one hand, he barely knew Sam and he would feel a little too forward, asking him out after only speaking maybe four or five times. On the other hand, lots of people hooked up without even knowing each other's names—Hell, _he_ had done that plenty of times himself. He fidgeted with his rolled up sleeve and sighed.

The door jingled.

His heart skipped up to his throat before he realized it was just some teenaged girl, and he scolded himself for being so pathetically hopeful. Stupid, stupid stupid—

But then it dinged again and that time it was Sam, and Gabriel kind of wanted to melt through the floor because Sam had his hair parted and swept back in a way that turned Gabriel into jelly. (He liked the floppy, boyish bangs, sure... But this was so... He had no words.) His voice cracked a little when he said, "Heya, Hercules!" He cleared his throat. "Anything specific, today?"

Sam leaned on the counter with a smile. "So, when are you gonna ask me out?"

"What?" Gabriel squeaked. He tried to keep the smile on his face but he would have much preferred sinking into the tiles.

"You obviously have a crush on me, and I think you're funny, so..." Sam spread his hands out, grinning wide. "When are you gonna ask me out?"

Gabriel covered his face. "Am I really that transparent?"

"You can never look me in the eye and you turn pink every five minutes."

Gabriel groaned.

Sam ducked his head to be more at Gabriel's level, and reached out to pull his hands from his face. His smile was nothing short of dazzling. "Chinese food across the street at six, tonight?" He kept his fingers curled loosely around Gabriel's wrists, warm and firm but not forceful.

Gabriel glanced down at the counter and then back up at Sam.

"Fine." He grinned.

Sam smiled wider and pulled his hands way. Gabriel kind of wanted to chase at them with his own fingers but he kept his hands to himself and crossed his arms. Sam turned away, but at the last moment, as if on impulse, he spun around and pressed a quick kiss to Gabriel's temple. And _then_ he walked away, out the door.

Gabriel slid down into a crouch, resting his forehead on the cool edge of the counter.

He laughed to himself.

...

1) The hair style I mentioned, with Sam's hair swept back, is the way his hair is as a priest in season 1. The rest of the time it's season 1 style floppy bangs.  
2) This is all. I might write about their date later though. Who knows.


End file.
